Roberson v. DeAnda: Probable Cause for “Interference” When a Bystander Refuses to Step Aside and Disrupts an Investigation; Resistance Independently Supplies Probable Cause; Undeveloped Property Claims Are Forfeited at Summary Judgment

1. Introduction

In Roberson v. Deanda (5th Cir. May 19, 2026) (per curiam, unpublished), Dennis B. Roberson sued four Texas officers—Eric DeAnda, Ishmael Flores, Patrick Gillis, and Donald Alsbrooks—under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 after an on-scene confrontation at Roberson’s business led to Roberson’s arrest and handcuffing. Body-worn camera video captured the encounter.

The core disputes were (i) whether officers had probable cause (or at least arguable probable cause) to arrest Roberson for interference with public duties (and later, for resisting arrest), (ii) whether the arrest involved excessive force, (iii) whether bystander officers could be liable for failing to intervene, and (iv) whether Roberson preserved a claim based on alleged property damage when an officer threw his phone.

2. Summary of the Opinion

The Fifth Circuit affirmed summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds for all defendants. It held:

  • Probable cause existed to arrest Roberson for interference with public duties because he repeatedly refused orders to step aside and continuously interrupted an active police investigation, moving beyond protected speech.
  • Independent probable cause also arose when Roberson pulled his arms away during the attempted arrest, supporting an arrest for resisting arrest even if the underlying arrest had been unlawful.
  • No excessive force was shown because Roberson failed to produce evidence linking any injury to the officers’ force (particularly given an alleged pre-existing back condition), and the Graham v. Connor factors favored the officers.
  • No failure-to-intervene liability attached because there was no underlying constitutional violation.
  • The property-damage/misappropriation claim was forfeited/abandoned because Roberson did not adequately defend or develop it in summary judgment briefing; the court was not required to scour video/record evidence for an undeveloped claim.

3. Analysis

A. Precedents Cited

1) Qualified immunity framework and summary-judgment methodology

  • Westfall v. Luna, 903 F.3d 534 (5th Cir. 2018): Used for de novo review of qualified-immunity summary judgment and later as a comparator on (i) when speech alone does not create probable cause under the interference statute and (ii) the need to connect alleged force to a concrete injury.
  • Ramirez v. Killian, 113 F.4th 415 (5th Cir. 2024), and Brown v. Callahan, 623 F.3d 249 (5th Cir. 2010): Supplied the burden rule—plaintiff must create a genuine fact issue both on constitutional violation and clearly established law to defeat qualified immunity.
  • Inst. for Free Speech v. Johnson, 148 F.4th 318 (5th Cir. 2025), Bailey v. Ramos, 125 F.4th 667 (5th Cir. 2025), Perniciaro v. Lea, 901 F.3d 241 (5th Cir. 2018), and Buehler v. Dear, 27 F.4th 969 (5th Cir. 2022): Reinforced the “clearly established” requirement and the Fifth Circuit’s insistence on specificity sufficient to place an official on notice that conduct is “definitively unlawful.”
  • Boyd v. McNamara, 74 F.4th 662 (5th Cir. 2023), and Carnaby v. City of Houston, 636 F.3d 183 (5th Cir. 2011): Required the court to view facts “in the light depicted” by video evidence and to give video significant weight at summary judgment.

2) Probable cause for interference with public duties vs. protected speech

  • Resendiz v. Miller, 203 F.3d 902 (5th Cir. 2000): Provided the basic definition of probable cause based on totality of circumstances known at the moment of arrest.
  • Haggerty v. Tex. S. Univ., 391 F.3d 653 (5th Cir. 2004): Provided the “arguable probable cause” gloss—immunity is lost only if there is not even arguably probable cause.
  • Bailey v. Ramos, 125 F.4th 667 (5th Cir. 2025): Supported the proposition that refusing simple dispersal/relocation commands (e.g., “go over there”) can create at least arguable probable cause for interference.
  • Spiller v. Harris County, 113 F.4th 573 (5th Cir. 2024): Reinforced that refusing to leave while officers conduct an investigation can reasonably be viewed as interference.
  • Childers v. Iglesias, 848 F.3d 412 (5th Cir. 2017): Demonstrated that noncompliance with police requests that impede police tasks (there, failing to move a truck) can establish probable cause under the interference rubric.
  • Freeman v. Gore, 483 F.3d 404 (5th Cir. 2007), and Westfall v. Luna, 903 F.3d 534 (5th Cir. 2018): Marked the boundary that “speech alone” (arguing with officers) generally does not constitute interference; Roberson distinguished these by emphasizing repeated disobedience and physical/positional obstruction that disrupted questioning.

3) Resisting arrest as an independent basis for probable cause

  • Ramirez v. Martinez, 716 F.3d 369 (5th Cir. 2013): Provided the key factual rule: pulling away from an officer’s grasp can suffice as resisting arrest under Texas Penal Code § 38.03.
  • Benfer v. City of Baytown, 120 F.4th 1272 (5th Cir. 2024): Supplied the doctrinal accelerant: even if the underlying arrest is unlawful, resistance can still generate probable cause for resisting arrest, insulating officers from wrongful-arrest theories once resistance occurs.

4) Excessive force standards and application

  • Killian, 113 F.4th 415: Provided the Fifth Circuit’s tripart test (injury; caused by excessive force; force clearly unreasonable).
  • Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989), and Deville v. Marcantel, 567 F.3d 156 (5th Cir. 2009): Supplied the three-factor objective-reasonableness framework (severity of crime; immediate threat; active resistance/flight).
  • Poole v. City of Shreveport, 691 F.3d 624 (5th Cir. 2012), and Buehler v. Dear, 27 F.4th 969: Supported the idea that refusal to comply and active resistance can justify escalated physical control measures without crossing into constitutional excess.
  • Westfall v. Luna, 903 F.3d 534: Used to illustrate the importance of evidence linking the challenged force to the asserted injury; pre-existing conditions complicate causation without medical/record support.

5) Bystander liability (failure to intervene)

  • Joseph ex rel. Joseph v. Barlett, 981 F.3d 319 (5th Cir. 2020), and Whitley v. Hannah, 726 F.3d 631 (5th Cir. 2013): Provided the four-part test for failure to intervene and the “acquiescence” requirement beyond mere presence. Roberson applied these by short-circuiting at the first element: no underlying violation, so no knowledge of a violation.
  • Buehler v. Dear, 27 F.4th 969: Offered a direct analogy—if no excessive force is shown, bystander liability fails.

6) Forfeiture/abandonment of claims and record-citation duties

  • RSR Corp. v. Int'l Ins. Co., 612 F.3d 851 (5th Cir. 2010): Emphasized that courts need not search the record for a party; the nonmovant must cite specific evidence and explain how it supports the claim.
  • Indigenous Peoples of Coastal Bend v. U. S. Army Corps of Eng'rs, 132 F.4th 872 (5th Cir. 2025), and Rosendale Missionary Baptist Church v. New Orleans City, 641 F.3d 86 (5th Cir. 2011): Supported the principle that undeveloped issues are forfeited and generally cannot be revived on appeal.
  • Rollins v. Home Depot USA, 8 F.4th 393 (5th Cir. 2021): Clarified waiver vs. forfeiture, which the panel noted are often conflated; the court treated Roberson’s omission as a preservation failure (functionally, forfeiture/abandonment).

B. Legal Reasoning

1) Probable cause for interference with public duties (Texas Penal Code § 38.15)

The court’s reasoning turned on conduct, not viewpoint. It acknowledged the line from Westfall v. Luna and Freeman v. Gore: arguing with officers alone is generally protected and not enough for interference. But the panel treated Roberson’s repeated refusals to move aside—while officers were actively questioning a suspect—as an operational disruption of police duties. That combination (noncompliance + interruption of an investigation) supplied probable cause (or at minimum arguable probable cause under Haggerty v. Tex. S. Univ.), defeating both wrongful-arrest and retaliatory-arrest theories.

2) Resistance as an independent probable-cause basis (Texas Penal Code § 38.03)

The panel added a second, independently sufficient ground: once Roberson pulled his arms away during the attempt to restrain him, officers had probable cause for resisting arrest under Ramirez v. Martinez. Importantly, relying on Benfer v. City of Baytown, the court treated that resistance as generating probable cause even if the initial interference arrest had been unlawful. This reasoning narrows the practical path for plaintiffs: after physical resistance, the litigation focus often shifts from “no probable cause to arrest” to whether the force used in response was excessive.

3) Excessive force: evidentiary causation and objective reasonableness

The court rejected the excessive force claim on two reinforcing grounds. First, it found an evidentiary gap: Roberson largely relied on his declaration asserting serious injury, but did not adequately link the injury to the specific force used, especially given a pre-existing back condition (invoking the causation emphasis seen in Westfall v. Luna). Second, applying Graham v. Connor, it found the offense severity factor modestly favored Roberson (misdemeanors), but the “threat” and “active resistance” factors favored the officers, given the unsecured scene, agitation, repeated noncompliance, and physical pulling away.

4) Failure to intervene: no underlying violation, no bystander liability

Under Joseph ex rel. Joseph v. Barlett and Whitley v. Hannah, a bystander must know a constitutional violation is occurring and have an opportunity to stop it. The panel held that because it found no unlawful arrest and no excessive force, the bystander claims necessarily failed at the threshold—there was no constitutional wrong to “intervene” against.

5) Property damage claim: forfeiture by inadequate briefing

Although the video purportedly showed Deputy DeAnda throwing the phone, the court treated the property claim as unpreserved because Roberson did not develop legal argument or identify record evidence of damages in response to summary judgment. Citing RSR Corp. v. Int'l Ins. Co., the panel stressed that courts are not obliged to mine video/record material to construct a litigant’s claim. The appeal could not revive a claim forfeited in the district court (per Indigenous Peoples of Coastal Bend v. U. S. Army Corps of Eng'rs and Rosendale Missionary Baptist Church v. New Orleans City).

C. Impact

  • Interference arrests and the “speech vs. obstruction” line: The decision reinforces that the Fifth Circuit will treat repeated refusal to comply with scene-management orders—when it tangibly disrupts police questioning—as crossing from protected speech into interference under Texas Penal Code § 38.15. Litigants should expect courts to focus on whether conduct impeded an identifiable police task, not merely whether words were critical.
  • Resistance as a litigation pivot point: By emphasizing Benfer v. City of Baytown, the court signals that once a suspect physically resists, “no probable cause for the initial arrest” becomes harder to litigate as a practical matter; plaintiffs must be prepared to prove excessive force with clear causation evidence.
  • Injury proof in excessive-force claims: The opinion underscores that self-serving testimony may be insufficient where medical causation is contested (e.g., pre-existing conditions). Plaintiffs should marshal medical records, expert support, or contemporaneous evidence linking the challenged force to the specific injury.
  • Record-development discipline at summary judgment: The property-claim disposition is a cautionary note: video evidence does not “save” an undeveloped claim. Parties must explicitly argue elements (including damages) and cite supporting record material, or the claim may be treated as forfeited.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

  • Qualified immunity: A doctrine that shields officials from damages unless the plaintiff shows (1) a constitutional violation and (2) that the violated right was clearly established at the time with sufficiently specific authority.
  • Probable cause vs. arguable probable cause: Probable cause is a reasonable belief, based on total circumstances, that an offense occurred. “Arguable probable cause” means that even if the officer was mistaken, immunity applies unless no reasonable officer could think probable cause existed.
  • Interference with public duties (Texas Penal Code § 38.15): Not mere criticism or arguing; it is conduct that actually disrupts, impedes, or interferes with officers performing lawful duties (such as questioning a suspect).
  • Resisting arrest (Texas Penal Code § 38.03): Physical resistance—like pulling away from an officer’s grasp—can be enough; and under Fifth Circuit precedent, resistance can create probable cause even if the initial arrest is later deemed unlawful.
  • Excessive force and the “Graham factors”: Courts assess force from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, considering crime severity, threat level, and whether the person resists or flees.
  • Failure to intervene (bystander liability): An officer can be liable for standing by only if a constitutional violation is occurring, the officer knows it, has time to stop it, and chooses not to.
  • Forfeiture vs. waiver: Forfeiture is failing to timely raise an argument; waiver is intentionally giving it up. Either can prevent later review, especially on appeal.

5. Conclusion

Roberson v. Deanda consolidates several Fifth Circuit themes in § 1983 policing litigation: (i) refusal to comply with scene-management orders that disrupt an investigation can constitute interference beyond protected speech; (ii) physical resistance can independently establish probable cause for resisting arrest, blunting wrongful-arrest theories; (iii) excessive-force claims require evidence linking force to injury, especially where pre-existing conditions exist; and (iv) claims not meaningfully developed at summary judgment—including those seemingly supported by video—may be treated as forfeited and cannot be resurrected on appeal.